Little wings for greener efficiency

Every era, every generation, every decade in human history has seen periods of growth, of stagnation and of crisis, in many different forms. In the past, the changeability of events and priorities had an impact locally and affected neighbouring communities very little: every village, every region, every county had its own economy and lifestyle that were only minimally affected by what was happening to their neighbours, good or bad.

Now, however, in the 21st century, the world is highly interconnected: what happens in one part of the world can cause reactions and consequences even in the most remote corners of the globe. The effects of Covid and the global supply chain crisis are just the latest result of what some scientists have called “the butterfly effect”: a small flap of the wings here can cause a tornado somewhere else.

Today humanity in its entirety feels the urgent need to tackle climate change together: the pandemic and the energy crisis have highlighted what it means to have and produce clean energy independently.

With this in mind, and specifically for the HVAC/R market, the EU has introduced directives and guidelines, including the F-gas regulation, with the aim of minimising the impact on the climate of the equipment and refrigerant gases used, thus reducing the industry’s, and our own, carbon footprint. The next short-term goal for stationary air conditioning equipment is that refrigerants with a GWP > 150 will be banned by 2025, and this is leading manufacturers to change over to refrigerants and technologies with a lower impact on global warming. For this reason, and especially in the HP market, R290, commonly called propane, is starting to become the dominant choice, and in some cases is virtually obligatory. It is therefore necessary to start designing units so as to take into account and mitigate the possibility of gas escaping, as it is classified category A3, i.e. is flammable. Carel has always worked alongside unit manufacturers, offering solutions that are compatible with R290, including the Power+ drive: the latest generation devices have been upgraded to meet the certification requirements for use with flammable gases.

Designed to improve efficiency and optimise the performance of compressors with permanent magnet motors, it has already been tested and is ready to operate with various models of compressors that use this refrigerant, approved in our laboratories. To date, more than 330 models are available in the Carel software libraries.

Furthermore, in its offering of high efficiency solutions, Carel also develops and supplies, together with its partners, variable-speed hermetic compressors that guarantee the highest level of efficiency.

The global compressor market is being driven by rotary technology, which is constantly growing, with sales exceeding 210 million units worldwide in 2021. Rotary compressors, mainly in the twin variant, are especially suitable for optimisation with low GWP, A2L and A3 refrigerants (R32, R290 etc.), thanks to their versatility and efficiency. The positive trend in sales of these compressors is even more marked in Europe, especially in the emerging market for R290 compressors in heat pump applications.

With this in mind, in addition to scroll units, Carel offers a complete range of rotary compressors for the main refrigerant gases with a low global warming potential.

Come and visit us at our stand to find out all the news on our “A3 READY” devices!!

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